Archive for May, 2009
« Previous Entries Next Entries »Question of the Day – Mozilo and Countrywide
Thursday, May 14th, 2009I saw in today’s WSJ that the SEC is about to charge Angelo Mozilo with fraud: The charges the SEC is considering include alleged violations of insider-trading laws and alleged failure to disclose material information to shareholders, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Mozilo sold $130 million of Countrywide stock in the first [...]
Health Care Tax B.S.
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009Read this: Smokers, Drinkers to Carry Tax Burden? Democrats want to tax bad behavior by increasing taxes on cigarettes and beer. Okay, this is stupid. What about all the other “bad foods” out there: • Cookies and cakes • Hamburger Helper (come on, you know it’s junk food) • Hot dogs • White bread • [...]
What’s the Point of the Barron’s 500?
Tuesday, May 12th, 2009This week’s Barron’s featured the 11th Annual Barron’s 500. What is the Barron’s 500? Well, I’ll let Barron’s explain it (emphasis mine): The Barron’s 500, a unique ranking of the 500 largest (by sales) public companies in the U.S. and Canada, is prepared by HOLT, a unit of Credit Suisse. The survey compares companies on [...]
The S&P Smallcap 600 Has Fared Better Than the S&P 500 During the New Millenium
Monday, May 11th, 2009Remember my post from last week about how the S&P 500 Index has fared during the New Millenium? Well, I went back and gathered up the numbers for the the S&P Smallcap 600 Index and crunched them for you to come up with this graphic: The process for getting these numbers was quite tedious. I [...]
Why Do We Listen to Analysts?
Monday, May 11th, 2009Okay, I’m reading in the Wall Street Journal this morning about how stocks no longer look cheap. In the article they talk about how, according to most valuation measures, stocks are no longer cheap. The standard measure of a stock’s valuation is usually the P/E ratio, or the price/earnings ratio. There are a couple of [...]
S&P History by Decade
Thursday, May 7th, 2009This is a follow-up to my last post on the S&P 500 Index’s performance from 2000 through April 2009. It’s hard to believe that we are closing out our first decade of the New Millenium. If things don’t change for the remainder of 2009, this decade will be the worst in the history of the [...]
The S&P 500 Hasn’t Fared Well During the New Millenium
Thursday, May 7th, 2009The New Millenium hasn’t been good for the S&P 500 Index. Take a look at the graphic below to see what I mean: • Through April, there were 112 months during the New Millenium. • Of those 112 months, 63 had positive total returns, while 49 of them were negative. • The best monthly total [...]
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